The President of Georgia Mikheil Saakashvili:
"Earlier it was like this - when chief of mafia flew from Barcelona to Tbilisi, the Minister of Internal Affairs, accompanied by the escort met him personally at Tbilisi airport. Now - "thieves in law" are sitting in cells and are cleaning their own cells. Where is it like this - thieves in law are touching the floor-cleaning cloth - but in our country they do, they really do."
Only in six years Mikheil Saakashvili and his young group managed to turn a backward patriarchal country into a blossoming and developing modern European state.
There is a picture hanging on the wall at the new, but not rich President's Palace, where Mikheil Saakashvili is pictured with a British pop-star Kate Melua. He is holding Kate Melua like a bride in his hands - this hot-tempered, Caucasian macho, who became a President when he was 36 years old after the Rose Revolution, held the whole beautiful Georgia in his hands exactly like this towards better life.
Our interlocutor is gifted with a Hollywood smile, Tamada's eloquence and what's most important with perfect intellectual skills. His successful education at Columbia University proves this. He was granted with Master's Degree at Columbia University. He also studied in Strasburg University of Human Rights, Academy of European Law in Florence and Academy of International Law in Hague.
In 2010 Russian President Medvedev declared Saakashvili as a persona non grata. Before that, holding a conversation with the French President Nicola Sarkozy the PM of Russia Vladimer Putin promised to hang him with one part of his body. But I doubt that they hate Saakashvili not for his "military crime", but because of the fact that this tiny country, with zero gas or oil resources, is way ahead of Russia in the sphere of economic growth. This approach is discrediting administrational-oligarchic model, which was introduced to Russia by them and their group. It is not a secret that the country gains authority not by the strength of military forces and number of arms, but how much developed the economy is, how the people live and how people believe in their future. Mikho, as he is called in Georgia, managed to do a miracle in a country that is known by traditional Caucasian warmth, full of relative liaisons and on the other hand in a country that was thrown in Stone Era by ungifted management of their former colleagues. In those times electricity was available only for three hours a day and flats in Tbilisi were heated by kerosene heaters.
Before, various post-soviet leaders, proud of themselves at the discussing forums were planning how to lure foreign investors in Russia, Ukraine and so on and how to avoid export of goods - Saakashvili was acting with authoritarian and at the same time severe methods. He was occupied by turning Georgia's internal and foreign policy into American, positively settled template.
Today Georgia is called "Caucasian Tiger" - this country demonstrates enormous increase of economic tempo even during the crises, taking into consideration that nothing unnatural was done for it.
You can judge by yourself: in one moment the number of licenses were decreased from 909 to 144 and if businessmen have no time for it for some reasons, the licenses are automatically issued.
Just three days and three procedures are needed for starting a new business.
From existed 22 taxes only 6 remained to be active, two more will have been abolished by 2012.
For releasing an employee, the employer has to give a four-day notice and issue one-month salary (the employer is not obliged to pay overtime with increased tariff and coordinate his actions with Professional Union).
There were 32 types of tariffs of taxes on import, today there are only three: 0, 5 and 12 percent. (Zero on cars and equipment; most of the taxes fall on agriculture and constructing materials). At the same time the custom officers are competing with each other who will first complete the registration of goods - the winners deserve bonuses.
The period of getting all possible permissions and discuss commercial disputes by means of Court, decreased several times; crime is practically abolished. But massive anticorruption cleansing followed all these processes in Law Enforcement structures, in state apparatus and arbitrage systems. And the results are obvious: the country has transformed in a glance. I saw beautiful roads everywhere with my own eyes, streets are lightened, I saw happy, smiling faces. As you know the value of reforms and transformations is defined by an internal and living condition of one regular citizen.
"The only place, where poor Georgians had a chance to study was Ukraine".
- I would like to greet you Mr. Mikheil, I will not hide the fact that it is pleasant to be your guest...
- I am really glad you have visited us. You have reached us finally!
- Georgians have been loved in Ukraine for centuries and now they are looking at you with eyes full of hope: will that grand transformation, which was initiated by you, become real. Personally I haven't visited Tbilisi for two years, but it is easily visible that reforms are going on with a full-scale...
- Can you imagine, though it was always on the contrary: everything what was considered to be best was copied from Ukraine. When in the 90ies I was visiting almost my motherland Ukraine not as a student, but as a representative of Georgia, it was inspiring me. Why? Not everything was destroyed in your country - you had maintained certain discipline and rules.
Life was felt in your country - the streetlights worked, houses were heated, communal services were functioning, people used to walk out their dogs during evening time and used to go to their summer-houses on weekends... at one glance - nothing unusual happened there, but in Georgia nothing like this was going on: bullet shooting was heard everywhere, the country was annihilated and robbed barbarian methods - in one word the country was falling into the underworld.
When I was running for the President first time, Georgia was twice poorer than Ukraine and during the last Presidential elections, when I was preparing for some events in the frames of my campaign, I started to think: "They may ask me about the Ukraine and I will have to say that we are progressing, that we are ahead of them in indicators".
I called my office and required: "Bring me the data, showing how we catch up with Ukraine in income per capita", the answer was: "We are ahead by 30 percent".
I didn't believe in it then... "Impossible! - I shouted, - call the International Monetary Fund, the World Bank and get me the exact data before I arrive. But they confirmed right away: "The mistake is impossible - we can tell you more - in two years we will be twice wealthier than Ukraine (of course "wealthy" is an exaggerated form, but we will have more income per capita)".
I remember how surprised I was, because in reality Ukraine has more chance for development than Georgia or Estonia. Country, which has several times more resources, has extremely talented and hard-working population, has a very good geographical location and the best black ground soil all around the world - cannot be poor at all. This is why I believe that for Ukraine, that has huge potential without any doubts, all these difficulties are only temporary.
- Georgia was awfully corrupt republic in the period of the Soviet Union...
- Is this true...
- I have even heard that you went to Kiev to study there, because you were asked to pay enormous money when you passed entrance exams at the University in Tbilisi...
- Yes - 25 thousand Rubles here and 50 thousand in Moscow. The only place where poor Georgians had a chance to study was Ukraine. Though it was visible that our compatriots didn't know how to spend their money. Recently I read an interview of Igor Blokhin in "Gordon Boulevard", who was recalling how the football players of "Dynamo Kiev" soccer-club got "Volgas" for official price and were sold those cars to Georgians at three times more expensive prices. Yes (he laughs) they thought we could afford it... Many jokes were told about this fact in those days - for example - how a Georgian father sent his son a trolleybus, to ride in it, the way others did...
This was like a stereotype: Georgia was the most corrupt country, in today's Russia 80 percent of "thieves in law" are Georgians - they say such Georgians are in Ukraine as well. Corruption was an indivisible part of the Georgian lifestyle, the same can be said about Georgian "table" or, almost like our religion, it was part of our national culture. It was considered at the same time that Georgians simply do not like to work, they are lazy and they can only entertain guests by singing and dancing...
- ...Plus sell tangerines...
o - Exactly.
- This is why people think that it was impossible to replace such a lunker...
- But it turned out that all this was such nonsense and it is quite possible...
"We have 27-28 year-old ministers - they were not pioneers and I doubt that they know who is that granite man standing in Kiev, in the beginning of Shevchenko Boulevard".
- I want to focus on the reforms carried out by you that impressed me so much. Is it true that there are no people over 40 in the Georgian government?
- Yes, it is true. Only the Minister of Foreign Affairs Grigol Vashadze is over 40. He was rudely kicked out of the USSR Ministry of Foreign Affairs in 1988, because at the Party congress he told Gorbachov everything he thought about the country's future. Grigol Vashadze, a young, promising diplomat was not arrested just because he was married to the future national artist of the USSR Nino Ananiashvili, but they put his name into the blacklist. He was not allowed to travel abroad with his wife, so he had suffered a lot. If we don't count Grigol Vashadze, who joined us later, I am the oldest member of our team. (I consider myself to be a group member and I have no pretensions that I possess the truth).
These people didn't work during Soviet times - for example I was a graduate, when the Soviet Union collapsed. We have ministers who are 27-28 years-old and they do not remember the lifestyle of the communists. They were not pioneers and I doubt that they know who is that granite man standing in Kiev, in the beginning of Shevchenko Boulevard.
- They have no clue and it is ok, right?
- In reality it is good, because they are not burdened with the features of the Soviet nomenclature. I often go to the ministries and attend councils where about 30-40 young servicemen gather and talk to them -they do the new generation in the Georgian government!
- As far as I am concerned people in Georgian government are very educated, most of them graduated American and British Universities...
- Yes, but we haven't collected them specially. It happened so, because the educational system simply collapsed long ago. This was the most corrupt sphere in Georgia - this system even left behind the police and other state services. This is why many Georgians left Georgia to receive education abroad.
By the way, it is important that during last seven years, to be more precise - for more than six years, more Georgians return than go abroad. This happens not because we have become rich, but because the young generation found some perspectives in their own country. According to the inquiries (the data is not exact, with only slight differences), 80 percent of population, mainly young people under 30 fully support my party - United National Movement. And you know why? Because they consider that they have future and it is explained with a fact that there are many young servicemen in our government, who are about their age.
I want to transform our society into the European standards, we should "vaccinate" them on Western mentality. Recently we have brought 3 000 young teachers from America, Australia, New Zealand, Australia. They will teach not only in the cities, but in villages as well - in every single school (we have exactly 3 000 schools and have exactly 3 000 teachers). We intend to increase this number to 4 000 next year and to 10 000 in future. This means that we will have about two or three volunteers at each school. In about five or six years everybody in Georgia will speak English. This is not some sort of caprice, but this is a very important condition for receiving modern information, for knowing what happens around the world.
We speak the language that is not spoken anywhere else around the world, like Basks in Spain - due to one scientific hypothesis these two are alike. The Georgian nation is a small nation if you compare us with the Ukrainians and the Polish. We cannot judge in this way: we communicate in our own language and the others must learn our language! Some people may learn our language, but they are very few. So, it is necessary to become a part of the modern world, integrate in it... We equipped every child with a computer, but what will the result be if they don't know any other language besides Georgian? This is why we refuse to have a direct translation - we watch movies only in the original language with Georgian subtitles in order to make people get used to the foreign speech.
- I was told that many people start learning Chinese, is it true...
- I call on everyone to do it, but I doubt I would ever learn Chinese. Pressure is not acceptable, but English will be taught from the first grade in every school. At this moment we intend to double those teachers' salaries, who will learn English and computers. By the way, their salary has already reached 400-600 USD.
- Isn't it wonderful! - And this is called poor Georgia...
- Yes, but please get me right - there are certain things where you cannot make economy... Education, I think is most important. Our government must be competent and literate.
"We have abolished Epidemiological Station - before, instead of cleaning restaurants from cockroaches indeed, the owners were spending their money on other cockroaches - from state services".
- I want to ask you something that surprise millions of Ukrainians - for example I know that by your strong decision you have simplified tens of services and license giving procedures. What made you do this?
- You can judge by yourself.
For example we have abolished Epidemiological Station: now no one goes to restaurants in order to check if there are cockroaches in their kitchen. But the number of cockroaches is decreasing not because there is no Epidemiological Station any more. We all know that the doctors from that service were only collecting bribes. And the owners used to spend their money on the other cockroaches - from the state services - instead of cleaning kitchens from the real cockroaches.
- What about Fire Fighting Inspection that you have abolished by one move of your hand?
- So what, do you think we have more fire because no one checks anti-fire security? Which owner wants to turn their facility into the flaming piece of wood? I am not arguing with you: all these services are good, if people working there have good discipline - if Fire Fighting Inspection would care about protecting people from the fire indeed and Epidemiological Station would care for the health of the population, we wouldn't do anything like this.
We had a very pleasant neighbor, where I grew - he was the deputy at some state standard service. He was very rich man, because he inspected the products produced in Georgia, if answered some fabri